The Metro bus service has created a new bus route to accommodate Portland’s high school students, who will no longer be served by yellow school buses when the school year begins Sept. 2.

Route 9, which launched this week, loops around the city, hitting Portland, Deering and Casco Bay high schools, and includes some service into the North Deering neighborhood.

Route 9A travels clockwise from the Portland Public Library via Congress Street to Stevens Avenue, where Deering High School is located. It then hits Allen Avenue, where Casco Bay High School is located, returning downtown via Washington Avenue. Route 9B will run counterclockwise on the same route.

Officials approved the use of Metro buses as part of a plan to add 20 minutes to the school day for all grades and reorganize the yellow school bus system. Moving high school students to Metro buses freed up the district’s yellow bus fleet to make more runs in a shorter amount of time to accommodate changes in start times for elementary and middle school students.

High school students received their student Metro passes in June, along with code of conduct and safety tips, and they were asked to sign a form agreeing to follow those rules. They were allowed to use the passes, which double as student ID cards, this summer to get accustomed to the Metro service, but the passes will only be good during the school year after Sept. 2.

In July, Metro reported 5,882 rides by high school students. Portland has about 2,100 high school students.

On the Metro website’s “trip planner” application, students can enter their home address and get information about the closest Metro stop and how much time it will take to get to their school. A survey of student addresses found that 82 percent of Portland’s high school students live within a quarter-mile of a Metro stop.

Supporters of the change note that in the past, yellow bus service wasn’t available to students who lived within two miles of their high school, while the Metro pass is available to all high school students. Many students reported they were already using Metro service during the school year because they didn’t qualify for yellow-bus service.

CONCORD, N.H. — A New Hampshire prep school that has educated some of the nation’s elite for more than a century and a half is confronting a campus practice of sexual conquest after a senior was charged with raping a 15-year-old freshman girl.

In a series of letters over the past year to students, parents and alumni, St. Paul’s School Rector Michael Hirschfeld candidly acknowledged the sexual assault charges and vowed to re-examine campus culture to see how a practice known as the “Senior Salute” had been allowed to develop.

“While the allegation and the people it involves will not be a topic of conversation at the school, the broader issues it raises – the use of social media to perpetuate unhealthy relationships, the ‘hookup’ culture and unsanctioned student ‘traditions’ – will be,” Hirschfeld wrote on Aug. 7, 2014, a month after Owen Labrie was charged with rape and other felonies.

Labrie is on trial in Concord, home to the Episcopal prep school founded in 1856.

Set on a leafy, shaded campus on the hem of New Hampshire’s capital city, St. Paul’s looks more college than high school. Red brick buildings with soaring arches and columns dot rolling hills, and athletic fields are emerald in mid-August heat. The school has seen future Nobel winners pass through its doors, along with Pulitzer Prize winners, senators, international business executives, bishops and diplomats.

NEW PRACTICE, OLD PROBLEM

Prosecutors say Labrie, now 19, of Tunbridge, Vermont, enticed the girl to the roof of an academic building last year as part of the “Senior Salute,” in which seniors try to have sex with underclassman. Labrie has pleaded not guilty and says the two had consensual sexual contact, but not intercourse, which would be a crime given their age difference.

Katherine Tarbox, who graduated from St. Paul’s in 2000, said the “Senior Salute” is a new phenomenon that underscores an old problem. After speaking with recent graduates, she believes the practice arose within the past two to three years. She says it shows that the well-educated and privileged don’t discuss sexual crimes and don’t understand the consequences of their behavior.

Tarbox, who wrote a book about her own sexual assault at the hands of a man she met online, has been a national advocate for sexual violence prevention. She said she reached out to Hirschfeld a year ago to recommend the school hire an independent investigator.

“It was clear to me the school didn’t have a good hands-on grasp on the scope of the problem,” she said, adding that she thinks the intense current scrutiny of the school will lead to change.

Students don’t start returning to the campus until after Labor Day.

Shamus Khan, a 1996 St. Paul’s graduate, wrote a book about the school detailing some of the traditions spawned by its hierarchy. He doesn’t mention the “Senior Salute” but writes of “newb nights,” when older girls order new girls to talk about their sexual activity, sometimes with boys invited to listen. He also wrote of how sex was used as currency at the school.

“If a desirable older boy is interested in a new girl, this means a lot for her status and the status of her dorm,” Khan wrote.

School officials declined requests for interviews, but in Hirschfeld’s letters, he outlines actions the school took.

After Labrie’s arrest, school officials said they would expel anyone participating “in any game, ‘tradition,’ or practice of sexual solicitation or sexual conquest under any name” and those possessing keys or access cards they aren’t entitled to. Labrie is said to have used a key that was shared among seniors to get to restricted areas.

PAINFUL PAST YEAR

The school, which first admitted girls in 1971, also brought in experts to discuss topics including substance abuse, harassment and building healthy relationships. It also teaches students how to recognize and interrupt behaviors to prevent sexual violence.

In one letter, Hirschfeld told students and parents the past year has been painful but productive:

“Introspection has not only fostered important conversations about the nature of our common life – its blessings, as well as its pitfalls – but importantly this introspection has prompted positive change, change that has been effected by our students.”

WASHINGTON — Many Americans, especially public-school parents, give low marks to rating a teacher based partly on how students perform on standardized tests, according to a survey.

The Gallup Poll released Sunday found that 55 percent opposed linking teacher evaluations to their students’ test scores. Opposition was even stronger among those with children in public schools, at 63 percent.

Standardized tests are necessary, but there’s an over-reliance on them, said Joshua Starr, CEO of Phi Delta Kappa International, an association for educators and a former school superintendent. PDK, which supports teachers and educational research, paid for the poll conducted by Gallup.

“Parents see the work their kids bring home every night,” Starr said in an interview. “They go to teacher conferences, and they’re more likely to judge the school and the quality of the teacher based on that, than solely using test scores.”

As many schools prepare for a return to the classroom in the coming weeks, more than 40 states are moving forward with plans to evaluate teachers and principals in part on how well their students perform on standardized tests. It’s something the U.S. Department of Education has supported and encouraged through its Race to the Top grants to schools and other programs. Although the department says other factors should be considered – such as student work and parent feedback – teachers, unions and others worry there’s too much emphasis on test scores.

Nearly two-thirds of those in the online survey said too much emphasis is placed on standardized testing in public schools. Nineteen percent said they were comfortable with the tests, 7 percent said there was too little emphasis and 10 percent didn’t know.

Other findings of the survey, which included a telephone poll of 1,000 American adults supplemented with an online poll of nearly 3,500 more:

• Of public-school parents questioned in the online poll, nearly half – 47 percent – said parents should be allowed to excuse their children from taking one or more standardized tests, 40 percent disagreed and 13 percent didn’t know.

• Fifty-four percent of public school parents oppose having teachers use the Common Core standards to guide what they teach in math and English, while 25 percent favored them.

• Eighty-four percent said all children should be vaccinated before they attend a public school; 9 percent disagreed.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — New Mexico’s attorney general said Monday he will investigate how the state’s largest school district hired a high-level administrator who faces child sex abuse charges in Colorado.

The district’s new superintendent, meanwhile, faces increasing pressure to resign over the debacle.

Attorney General Hector Balderas announced his office will look into why Albuquerque Public Schools’ safety protocols were dismissed and former deputy superintendent Jason Martinez was hired in June before a background check was completed.

Superintendent Luis Valentino hired Martinez to head the district’s instruction and technology division.

Martinez resigned abruptly last week. It later surfaced that he faces four felony counts of sexual assault on a child in Colorado involving two victims. Two previous counts have been dismissed, according to the Denver District Attorney’s Office.

A lawyer for Karen Rudys, the district’s interim assistant superintendent for human resources, said Valentino was informed multiple times about Martinez refusing to complete his background check but ignored those concerns.

“This was a horrific breach of trust for the parents of APS,” Balderas said Monday. He stopped short of saying if his office would seek criminal charges, but he said the office will see if the district conducted necessary criminal background checks on other employees.

Valentino was selected for the superintendent post in June, and the school board plans to vote Thursday on whether he should be dismissed.

Valentino was associate superintendent/chief academic officer in the San Francisco Unified School District from July 2012 to June 30.

He was an employee in good standing, and the district is not conducting an inquiry about his hiring practices while in San Francisco, said Gentle Blythe, a school district spokeswoman.

WASHINGTON — U.S. high schools haven’t shown much improvement in the past four years when it comes to preparing college-ready graduates, according to the Iowa-based nonprofit group that administers the ACT college entrance exam.

The group says only about 40 percent of graduating high school students who took the ACT exam this year show a “strong readiness” for college in most subject areas. Meanwhile, 31 percent of these students aren’t meeting readiness levels in any core subject areas.

These levels are about the same as four years ago. The data also shows negligible changes among ethnic groups since 2011, with white and Asian-American students still dramatically outperforming other ethnicities.

ACT Chief Executive Officer Jon Whitmore called the findings a “wake-up call” and said the education system must do more to prepare students, particularly minorities.

The study looked at the 1.9 million students in the 2015 graduating class who took the ACT. This represents about 59 percent of all graduating students.

According to its findings:

• Asian-American students outperformed all other ethnic groups in math and science, with 69 percent of Asian-American students taking the ACT meeting its college readiness standard in math and 57 percent in science.

• African-American students lagged behind significantly in all areas. Only 14 percent of black students taking the ACT test passed the college readiness standard for math, 12 percent in science, 34 percent in English and 19 percent in reading.

• That’s compared to 52 percent of white students who passed the college readiness standard in math, 48 percent in science, 75 percent in English and 56 percent in reading.

• About 29 percent of Hispanics who took the ACT passed the readiness standard in math, 23 percent in science, 47 percent in English and 31 percent in reading.

GORHAM — Better-than-expected fall enrollment figures at the University of Southern Maine mean there won’t be layoffs at the campus this year, new USM President Glenn Cummings told a gathering of faculty and staff Thursday.

The university has been wracked with layoffs and protests in recent years during a series of budget deficits. Last year, officials eliminated five academic programs and 51 faculty positions because of budget cuts, and remain in arbitration with the union over the layoffs.

“I’ll be honest, the first day I was a little bit nervous,” said Cummings, who took office two months ago. But “USM is like an ugly 1970s carpet you lift it up and there’s this beautiful hardwood floor underneath. I’m not kidding you. We have every possible asset to succeed.”

When Cummings took office, he said fall enrollment numbers were down 13 percent, which translated to a $2.5 million shortfall on top of the $4.8 million deficit already in the $128 million budget for the year beginning July 1.

But Thursday, Cummings said the enrollment gap has been closed to about 7 percent down from the same time last year. That has erased the $2.5 million shortfall, said Chief Financial Officer Buster Neel, who has said previously that the $4.8 million deficit will be covered with reserves and budget adjustments, not cuts to academic programs.

At the annual welcome breakfast at the Gorham campus, Cummings acknowledged the “painful” staff and faculty cuts last year.

“We have to be real about the pain we’ve experienced. We lost 119 people in one year,” Cummings said. “Not a single one lost their job for incompetence. In fact, we lost some of the best people we had. If we don’t acknowledge it, we can’t move on.”

Cummings, the former speaker of the Maine House, emphasized that he was working to rebuild trust with students and faculty, and asked the faculty and staff to work toward increasing enrollment and solving problems in their departments.

“Our best asset is you,” he told the crowd of more than 500 faculty and staff gathered in the Field House. “We have amazing faculty and dedicated staff. We just have to put it together.”

MAKING CRITICISM CONSTRUCTIVE

As he finished his speech, the crowd gave him a standing ovation.

“Glenn struck a very positive note,” said USM economics professor Susan Feiner, co-president of the faculty union. “He was encouraging without being Pollyanna-ish.”

Cummings laid out several specific goals for USM, including increasing freshman-to-sophomore retention rates to at least 70 percent, compared with the current 60 percent, and increasing alumni giving from the current 2 percent to an industry standard of about 10 percent.

He also set two specific five-year goals: creating a $50 million scholarship fund for students, and increasing overall campus enrollment from the current 8,900 students to more than 10,000.

He asked the faculty and staff to take an active role, “with freedom and autonomy” in reaching those goals.

“We are changing the way we do work around here,” Cummings said. “We don’t need to micromanage you. I believe all of you have the answers on how to improve enrollment in your department or improve morale.”

In plain language, Cummings urged the crowd to be discreet in criticisms of the university and each other during “a very sensitive time,” a reference to the volatile protests that accompanied layoffs last year. Division on campus can affect students’ impressions of the university, he said.

“Don’t think students are not looking at that. They care, they want to hear that you support each other,” Cummings said. “We have a culture of professionalism that we’ve never needed more desperately. I ask you for grace, to hold back on your worst instincts.”

Cummings said he welcomed criticism and difficult conversations in private, but not aired “on Facebook,” and he urged faculty and staff to actively participate in the effort to improve the university.

“We won’t get there doing what we’ve done the last few years,” he said. “We have to have those tough conversations.”

TURNING SHIP AROUND TOGETHER

Faculty Senate President Tom Parchman said he was looking forward to working with Cummings “to be part of that course correction” and bring the faculty back to engage “with civility” on the issues facing USM.

Cummings peppered his talk with self-deprecating asides, from joking about how his decision to bike from Portland to Gorham led to the “disturbing visual” of a middle-aged man in spandex, to assurances that he plans to stay forever at USM, in part because his wife “will unambiguously divorce me if I go back into politics.”

He closed on a more somber note, pledging that “we are going to try to get it right.”

“Everyone wants to be part of a winning team,” he said. “You are already that winning team. I’m just honored to be telling the community, telling the world, how great you are.”

Since taking office, he has backed up his candor with personal sacrifices. In a recent interview with the Press Herald, Cummings said he discovered over the summer that he didn’t have any funds to pay for lunches at a series of getting-to-know-you meetings he was holding with faculty, staff and students. He decided to decline using a university-issued cellphone and used the $5,000 to pay for the meetings, he said.

The budget crunch has been felt across the state’s seven-campus university system. The system’s $518 million budget for the year that began last month uses $7 million in emergency funds despite cutting 206 positions systemwide. The $529 million budget for the prior year, which ended June 30, required using $11.4 million in emergency funds and cutting 157 positions.

The chairman of the USM Board of Visitors said the campus must increase enrollment and “we will grow our way out” of the recent financial challenges.

“This is an all-hands-on-deck undertaking,” Tony Payne said. “We need to be firing on all cylinders and with great urgency.”

Senior chemistry major Andrew Kiezulas said after Cummings’ speech that he was glad to hear him talk about a student-focused mission.

“It was inspiring,” Kiezulas said. “It’s not ‘you do it for us’ or ‘we do it to you’ – it’s ‘we do it together.’ Hearing that kind of talk always gets me fired up.”

WATERVILLE — Pulitzer Prize-winning New Yorker reporter Katherine Boo will receive Colby College’s 2015 Lovejoy Award, the school has announced.

Boo will be given an honorary doctoral degree and the Elijah Parish Lovejoy Award for courageous journalism on Oct. 5.

Boo “gives voice to the disadvantaged” and has spent more than 20 years in poor communities, writing about how “societies distribute opportunity and how individuals climb out of poverty,” said a Colby news release making the announcement. She has won not only a Pulitzer Prize for her work, but also a MacArthur genius grant and a National Book Award.

Colby College President David A. Greene, a member of the committee that selected Boo for the award, said the quality of her research, the intensity of her prose “and the critically important theme of inequality that informs much of her work all contributed to her selection.”

‘STORYTELLING AT ITS BEST’

“Katherine Boo analyzes the complex interplay of social, political and economic inequalities by exploring the everyday experiences of individuals – the gut-wrenching tragedies as well as the moments of personal triumph,” Greene said. “Her writing combines elements of journalism and ethnography and is crafted through her discerning intelligence and her unusual ability to hear universal stories in the peculiarities of daily interactions. Her work is storytelling at its very best and most illuminating.”

She won the 2000 Pulitzer Award for Public Service as a reporter for The Washington Post for disclosing “wretched neglect and abuse in the city’s group homes for the mentally retarded, which forced officials to acknowledge the conditions and begin reforms,” according to the Pulitzer committee. Her first book, “Behind the Beautiful Forevers: Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity,” won a National Book Award and was named one of the 10 best books of 2012 by The New York Times.

ENDURING LEGACY

David Shribman, executive editor of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and chairman of the Lovejoy selection committee, characterized the committee’s annual challenge as one of matching the work of a journalist with the enduring legacy of Lovejoy.

“In choosing Ms. Boo,” he said, “we have a perfect match – a journalist of purpose and courage who has taken on the vital issues of her time much the way Lovejoy took on the issues of his.”

Rebecca Corbett, a 1974 Colby graduate and assistant managing editor of The New York Times, as well as a member of the selection committee, said “Katherine Boo is among journalism’s great practitioners of narrative nonfiction, a writer who has devoted her career to illuminating the lives of the disadvantaged, the powerless, the people left behind.

“Her deep reporting, lyrical writing, and passion for social justice have produced unforgettable, heartbreaking stories about the aspirations, daily struggles, and humanity of ordinary people in terrible circumstances, without advocates or support,” Corbett said. “She gives them a voice.”

The Lovejoy Award, given annually since 1952, recognizes courage and themes of social justice in journalism.

It honors the memory of Lovejoy, who was killed in Alton, Illinois, for condemning slavery and for defending his right to publish. John Quincy Adams called him America’s first martyr to freedom of the press, the release said.

AUTHOR TO SPEAK

In addition to Greene, Shribman and Corbett, the committee that chose Boo includes Mike Pride, administrator of the Pulitzer Prizes and former editor of New Hampshire’s Concord Monitor; Stephen Engelberg, editor-in-chief of ProPublica; Christine S. Chinlund, managing editor for news at The Boston Globe; Marcela Gaviria, producer at PBS’ “Frontline”; and Martin Kaiser, retired editor and senior vice president of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Daniel M. Shea, director of the Goldfarb Center for Public Affairs and Civic Engagement, also is on the committee.

The Oct. 5 program will include a speech by Boo, who will be presented with the award at 7:30 p.m. in Colby’s Lorimer Chapel. The event is free and open to the public. A panel discussion, “Division and Despair: Reporting on Economic Inequality,” will feature national experts and top journalists at 4 p.m. in Ostrove Auditorium, in the Diamond Building.

Jennifer Wright Gregg teaches third grade in the Alternative Organization Structure 93 in Lincoln County.

She joined Great Salt Bay School in 2008 after several years teaching in Massachusetts.

At Great Salt Bay, she established the Junior Oyster program, during which her students go into the field to study aquaculture and marine science.

Wright Gregg integrates all aspects of her third-grade curriculum, including art and music, through that program.

She has a bachelor’s degree in multicultural education from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts, and a master’s degree in creative arts for education from Lesley College in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Angela McLaughlin is a literacy coach for grades pre-K-8 in the Glenburn Public School District in Penobscot County.

She joined Glenburn in 2000 and is the school’s first literacy coach. Previously, she taught third grade and middle school students.

She currently is an adjunct professor at the University of Maine.

McLaughlin has a master’s degree in literacy education from the University of Maine.

She now helps to teach master’s level classes in advanced reading and writing to other Glenburn teachers.

Brenda LaVerdiere teaches fourth grade in Regional School Unit 9 in Wilton in Franklin County.

She has been teaching at Academy Hill School since 1999, and her entire career – all at RSU 9 – spans 38 years.

She is an adviser for the Kids Can Club, an after-school program for at-risk students, and helped establish an educational partnership with Hannaford in 1990.

LaVerdiere has a bachelor’s degree in elementary and special education from the University of Maine at Farmington and a master’s degree in education from the University of Maine.

Mickie Flores teaches science and algebra to grades 6-8 in Consolidated School District 13 in Hancock County.

Flores, who joined Deer Isle-Stonington Elementary School in 2011 after a career in New York, was named a Maine Governor’s STEM Fellow in 2012.

Every two weeks Flores and her students videoconference with faculty from Vanderbilt University as part of the Beaming STEM Labs/AspirNaut program. She is also a lead teacher for the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens Lunder New Naturalist Program, through which her students join 20 schools across Maine collecting, sharing and responding to biodiversity data via the Lunder website.

In New York, Flores taught for more than 16 years in Canton Central School District and was an adjunct faculty member at State University New York in Potsdam for almost 10 years.

Flores has a bachelor’s degree in animal sciences from Cornell University in New York and a master’s of science in secondary education/biology from Elmira College in New York.

Talya Edlund teaches third grade in the Cape Elizabeth School District in Cumberland County.

Edlund joined Pond Cove Elementary School in 2004, serving as a literacy teacher and team leader. She began her career teaching second- and third-graders at P.S. 23 Carter Woodson School in Brooklyn, New York.

Before working at Pond Cove, Edlund was program coordinator for Project Safe and Smart at Lincoln Middle School in Portland and has been an adjunct instructor at Southern Maine Community College teaching college prep reading to English language learners.

Edlund has a bachelor’s degree in humanities from the University of Michigan and a master’s in elementary education from Brooklyn College.

CAPE ELIZABETH — Ask one of Maine’s best teachers for back-to-school advice and the last thing she wants to talk about is turning in homework on time, the merits of proper penmanship and why students should sit quietly in their seats.

“They don’t have to be perfect,” said Pond Cove Elementary School teacher Talya Edlund, a finalist for 2016 Maine Teacher of the Year. “Their job is to figure out how to work with the challenges and talents they have.”

Edlund, who years ago got advice that told her to “not smile for the first two months of school,” laughs at the absurdity of that notion today. “That’s not me.”

Instead, she’s more interested in asking her third-graders to make a lobster trap out of cardboard tubes, string and some tape. On the first day of class, she plans on giving them the absolutely messiest possible assignment so they can have some fun, learn that they can make a mess – and how to clean up.

Edlund and other teachers who were semifinalists for Teacher of the Year offered their advice for students going back to school, along with some wisdom for fellow teachers.

The eight semifinalists were selected from the 16 teachers identified as finalists in each county. This past week, Edlund; Brenda LaVerdiere, a fourth-grade teacher at Academy Hill School in Wilton; and technology integration specialist and English teacher Mia Morrison at Foxcroft Academy in Dover-Foxcroft were selected as the three finalists for Maine Teacher of the Year, which will be announced in October.

For students, the teachers say, standbys like getting enough sleep, reading more and getting exercise instead of spending time online are key.

“I would encourage students to not take on too much extracurricular activities and really pick wisely and do something with art. Don’t overload themselves,” said Jennifer Wright Gregg, who teaches third grade at Great Salt Bay Community School in Damariscotta. “I know it’s really hard because everyone is just going, going, going, going. I would encourage everyone to slow down a little bit. Save time for reading and drawing and just hanging out.”

Advice to students from Maine’s top teachers ranges from get lots of sleep to play outside to read, read, read every day.

FACING CONSTANT CHALLENGES

For teachers, the classroom and the education world have changed dramatically in recent decades, making teaching a little more difficult than instilling the three R’s.

Federal No Child Left Behind legislation introduced a wave of new testing protocols in the 1990s, punishing schools that didn’t improve fast enough. That has led to pressure on teachers to “teach to the test.” Another wave of change came a few years ago when dozens of states adopted new Common Core standards, spelling out what students should know in each grade.

In Maine, the education landscape shifted as Gov. Paul LePage introduced charter schools, a teacher evaluation system, annual A-F report cards for all the state’s schools, and proficiency-based graduation requirements.

Those changes have had an impact on the classroom. For example, last year Maine students took state assessments online for the first time instead of using paper and pencil, so teachers had to teach students how to take tests that way – and make sure the technology worked. Pushback from teachers and parents about the difficulty of administering the Smarter Balanced test, along with concerns about the content and opposition to national standards, led the state to drop the test. State education officials are now working to find a new test to give students this school year.

The teachers said they support the Common Core standards, but parents need to learn more about them.

“Common Core is changing the way we teach,” said LaVerdiere. “It’s designed to meet the needs of all kids. It is rigorous, but also designed to have real-world applications. Memorization is no longer good enough.”

But she understands the criticism. “It’s always difficult. It’s the unknown.”

Gregg, who said the standards mean students have to “dig deeper,” said the changes also mean parents may not be sure what’s happening in the classroom.

“There’s a lot of misunderstanding about what they are all about. It would be really good if parents understood what the Common Core is all about and what the Next Generation Science Standards are all about.”

Technology has also transformed the classroom itself. Even the youngest students use computers regularly, a big change for teachers who didn’t use technology until the last decade or so.

Another shift is tying education in the classroom to real-world experiences.

LaVerdiere, who has been teaching for 38 years, said she reached out to Hannaford in 1990 to form a partnership between the grocer and her classroom, leading to classroom visits by Hannaford employees and “orientation” exercises where students fill out job applications and prepare for a job interview. Hannaford managers interview the students, choose a job and the students “work” for a day at Hannaford.

“That is magical,” LaVerdiere said. “They are learning all the time.”

Another challenge is constantly adapting to new teaching styles and methods, such as switching from phonics-based reading instruction to whole language, or a new math instruction program. Teachers must go through extensive professional development training to learn the new methods, which can be controversial or time-consuming.

“I think there is a movement toward student-centered learning, but we’re not there yet,” said LaVerdiere. “Another model is expeditionary or project-based learning. … I’d like to be part of that conversation. Kids get engaged and they begin thinking at a deeper level.”

But shaking things up can also be invigorating, said Morrison.

“You want to keep it fresh,” said Morrison, one of the first to use iTunes U, an online platform of educational tools, at Foxcroft Academy. “As teachers, we get kind of bogged down by the responsibility and the time constraints and the budget constraints.”

Biddeford High School English teacher Nick Wilson in his classroom. Carl D. Walsh/Staff Photographer

ENOUGH SLEEP, PLENTY OF BOOKS

The teachers’ best advice for students is to tackle the year by getting organized – and read.

“Prioritize and set out time in your schedule for what is important,” Morrison said. “That doesn’t have to mean homework. … Think about where you want to be at the end of the year, and how you are going to get there.”

Several teachers said the fundamentals still apply.

“It boils down to this: Be kind. Work hard. Have fun. Read,” said Ben Brigham, who teaches English at Shead High School in Eastport.

And get enough sleep, he added.

“I’m dealing with teenagers and that really is a big piece of advice I give my kids. I see them around town and I tell them it’s time to start setting the alarm so you’re alert and ready to learn when you are in school,” Brigham said.

Reading and playing are particularly important for elementary school students, said Edlund, as she reorganized her classroom library – a back-to-school ritual of her own. Above her head, twine stretched across the ceiling with clothespins, ready for a year of art masterpieces. Small blue chairs were stacked on tables, alongside boxes of science experiments and books. Brightly colored bins with crayons, glue sticks, Legos and puzzles lined a bookshelf.

“Parents should read to their children every day,” she said. “Kids just need to play outside as much as possible.”

Angela McLaughlin, a literacy coach at Glenburn Elementary School, agreed.

“Just read every day. Make sure books are available to them, send them home with books every day, invite them into the library,” said McLaughlin, who makes a point of reading to her students every day, using dramatic voices for different characters.

“We are in the best profession there is,” she said. “When it gets tough, we have to keep to the heart of it – the students.”

All the teachers said they wanted most to make a connection with each student.

“If you can’t build a relationship with your students, you won’t be successful,” Brigham said. “You need them to be engaged or you’re talking to yourself.”

Mia Morrison teaches English and technology to grades 9-12 in Regional School Unit 68 in Piscataquis County.

An early adopter of using iTunes U in K-12 classrooms, Morrison was recognized by Apple in 2013 as a Distinguished Educator and travels across the country for numerous speaking engagements and workshops.

Morrison has been a technology and English teacher at Foxcroft Academy since 2007, and in 2013 was named the school’s first technology integration specialist.

She is currently an adjunct professor at the University of Maine College of Education and Human Development, teaches courses for the Maine Educators Consortium, and has published courses through iTunes U that have a subscription of over 125,000 students around the world.

Morrison has a bachelor’s degree in geological and earth sciences from Wesleyan University, a master’s degree in hydrology and water resources science from the University of Southern Florida and a master’s degree in instructional technology from the University of Maine.

Benjamin Brigham teaches English/language arts, technology, gaming and media to grades 9-12 in the Eastport School Department in Washington County.

In addition to teaching at Shead High School, Brigham is the school’s technology coordinator, supervising more than 150 computers as well as network services and equipment.

Brigham and his technology students created the “Games Are for Art” event, an annual 12-hour gaming marathon that raises funds for the Eastport Arts Center.

He serves on the board of the Eastport Arts Center and Eastern Maine Medical Center’s Child and Adolescent Care Center.

Previously, Brigham taught in Florida, Massachusetts and California, working with students from a wide range of socioeconomic and cultural backgrounds. He has a bachelor’s degree in secondary education from Pennsylvania State University.

Nick Wilson teaches English to grades 9-12 in the Biddeford School Department in York County.

Wilson, who began teaching at Biddeford High School in 2009, also teaches English at the University of Southern Maine’s Upward Bound program during the summers. Previously, he taught English at Marlborough (Massachusetts) High School for two years.

Wilson is on the Steering Committee for the New England Association of Schools & Colleges and coaches Biddeford High’s junior varsity baseball team.

He has a bachelor’s degree in English from the University of Southern Maine and a master’s in education curriculum and instruction from the University of Massachusetts. He is pursuing a certificate of advanced study in Educational Leadership.

South Portland’s new superintendent of schools sent a letter to the community on Monday outlining his expectations for the academic year ahead and beyond.

Teachers, custodians and other school employees have been working to ready the city’s eight schools for the return of 3,000 students, Ken Kunin said in a letter emailed to local newspapers. Grades 1 through 9 return Sept. 8, followed by kindergarten and grades 10 through 12 on Sept. 9.

After four years at the American Overseas School of Rome, Kunin said he’s thrilled to be back in Maine, where he previously served as an elementary and high school principal in Portland.

Kunin said he plans to learn all he can about the opportunities and challenges facing South Portland schools by reading reports, action plans and news articles, talking with staff members, students and community members, and observing the schools in action.

“After collecting and analyzing mountains of information, I will strive to communicate themes and trends to all with a stake in our schools to help us to move forward in meeting our mission: enriching lives through quality learning for all,” Kunin wrote.

Kunin said South Portland schools should be proud of the generations of students who have been educated in the past and of the work being done to promote proficiency-based learning that ensures all students succeed in the future.

“We look forward to giving you an ever more detailed picture of this work as the year unfolds,” Kunin wrote. “Of course, what we most look forward to is seeing our students strive, succeed, sometimes stumble, but always learn. Whether in the classroom or the band room, on the field or in the studio, we celebrate the efforts of our students, and all who help them, to build a better tomorrow.”

As the state nears its 10-school cap, fall enrollment figures at existing Maine charter schools show high demand, with most schools operating at or near capacity.

The state’s second virtual charter school, Maine Virtual Academy, launches Tuesday with 296 students logging in, just shy of its 297-student cap. The year-old Maine Connections Academy, the state’s first virtual charter school, is at capacity with 396 students this fall, with a waiting list of 140 students, officials said. Both schools serve grades 7-12.

Maine Virtual Academy leader Beth Ann Lorigan said the school’s nine teachers have been setting things up since mid-July.

“I have to say, it is very all-consuming,” said Lorigan, the chief executive officer. “We’ve had a lot of time to work together, and we’ve spent a lot of time training and planning for what we need to do this coming year.”

Lorigan said the students come from 91 school districts around the state.

“It’s amazing. Our schools are doing good,” said Shelley Reed, chairwoman of the Maine Charter School Commission, which authorizes and oversees the charter schools. A total of 1,540 students now attend charter schools in the state, which has a total of about 184,000 students.

Tuesday is also the deadline for the latest round of applications for groups hoping to open a charter school. Under the state’s 10-school cap, only three more schools can be approved.

Five groups have indicated they will apply, according to letters of intent filed in late June. Those groups are Inspire ME Academy in York County, Peridot Montessori Education in Hancock County, Sheepscot Bay Charter School in Wiscasset, Snow Pond Arts Academy in Sidney and a school in Lewiston-Auburn that has yet to be named.

“We could potentially reach our cap,” Reed said.

As of late Monday, none of the groups had submitted an application.

Supporters say the virtual schools, with students logging in from home for lessons, are good for students who may not fit in at traditional schools, such as athletes in training or students who have been bullied or have special needs. Virtual charter schools also have drawn criticism, in part, because local school boards outsource their management to for-profit companies that are beholden to shareholders.

Maine education and charter school officials note that they have imposed special rules on Maine virtual charter schools to address those concerns, including requirements that local school boards hire and employ all staff, that the schools maintain a physical location in Maine, and that teachers, administrators and staff live and work in Maine.

Maine Virtual Academy has a contract with K12 Inc. of Herndon, Virginia, the nation’s largest online education company, for academic services. Maine Connections Academy contracts its services from Connections Academy, a division of Maryland-based Connections Education, a for-profit company owned by Pearson PLC in London. Pearson is a multinational corporation that formulates standardized tests and publishes textbooks for many schools in the United States.

A 2012 Maine Sunday Telegram investigation of K12 and Connections Education showed that Maine’s digital education policies were being shaped in ways that benefited the two companies, that the companies recruited board members in the state, and that their schools in other states had fared poorly in analyses of student achievement.

Maine’s five brick-and-mortar charters reported enrollments this fall that are at or near capacity, and two schools have opened satellite campuses. As of this fall:

• Cornville Regional Charter School has about 105 students from 11 communities in grades K-8, with a waiting list of about 20 students.

• Maine Academy of Natural Sciences in Hinckley, a high school, is at capacity with 122 students from 27 school districts. There is a waiting list.

• Baxter Academy for Technology and Science in Portland is at capacity with 320 students, and has a waiting list of almost 100 students. The four-year high school also has opened a satellite campus at 561 Congress St., renting five classrooms with 8,000 square feet of space formerly used by the Salt Center for Documentary Studies. Baxter has a three-year lease, with an initial base rent of $45,000.

• Fiddlehead School of Arts and Science in Gray, serving grades prekindergarten to 4 this year, is at capacity with more than 101 students from 17 districts, and has a waiting list of about 100 children.

• Harpswell Coastal Academy, which serves students in grades 6-12, has about 200 students this year and will add 60-80 students per year for a full capacity of 120 middle school-age students and 160 high school-age students in the fall of 2016. This fall, it’s opening a satellite facility for its high school students at Brunswick Landing, formerly the Brunswick Naval Air Station, about 10 miles away. The school will pay rent of $48,000 a year for about 6,000 square feet of space.

Four groups have applied for the last three charter school slots available in Maine, which currently has seven charter schools.

Applying by Tuesday’s deadline were Inspire ME Academy in York County, Peridot Montessori Education in Hancock County, Snow Pond Arts Academy in Sidney, and Acadia Academy in Lewiston-Auburn.

The Maine Charter School Commission reviews applications and authorizes schools, a months-long process with multiple steps. The commission will take a first vote Oct. 13 on advancing the new applications to a second phase, which involves interviews, and then make a final decision Nov. 17.

If it approves any of the schools, they would open in the fall of 2016.

Sheepscot Bay Charter School in Wiscasset had filed a letter of intent but did not apply. A commission administrator said the group was working with the local school instead of applying for a charter.

Inspire ME would serve grades four through eight; Peridot would serve pre-K through eighth grade; Snow Pond would serve grades nine through 12; and Acadia would serve pre-K through sixth grade.

The actual applications – which are hundreds of pages long and spell out the details of each school, including size, finances, curriculum and other factors – were not immediately available Tuesday from the commission.

State law allows a maximum of 10 charter schools. Maine already has five brick-and-mortar charter schools and two virtual charter schools. A total of 1,540 students attend charter schools in Maine, which has about 184,000 students.

Also Tuesday, the commission voted to allow commission chairwoman Shelley Reed to act on its behalf to approve a satellite facility for Baxter Academy for Technology and Science in Portland, which is located at 54 York St. The satellite facility, at 561 Congress St., consists of five classrooms with 8,000 square feet of space formerly used by the Salt Center for Documentary Studies. Baxter has a three-year lease, with an initial base rent of $45,000, but school officials say they are already looking for larger space to accommodate the entire school.

Commission officials said Tuesday that using the Congress Street space for this fall’s incoming class has been delayed while toilets and other items are added to the site to meet city code on K-12 school facilities.

In an Aug. 22 email to Bob Kautz, executive director of the commission, Baxter officials described the use of 561 Congress St. as “a transitional move.”

“While we have entered into a three-year lease, we are already looking at plans for another nearby facility of 30,000 square feet which could accommodate our entire student body (325-350),” wrote Carl Stasio, Baxter Academy’s executive director.

In an email Tuesday, Stasio said the school wanted to remain in Portland and that the “longer-term goal” was to find a larger space for the entire school. He declined to provide any details of the eventual move, saying it “might compromise our ability to get the best offer for our school.”

WATERVILLE — Downtown was awash in color and activity Thursday as 84 Colby College freshmen created temporary parks at the four corners of Main and Temple streets as part of orientation activities at a time when the college is trying to be more involved in the city’s cultural life.

The students not only got to know each other, they chatted with people strolling downtown, met shop owners and played games with adults and children alike in the park spaces.

“I think it’s a good bonding experience,” said freshman Sophie Wood, 20, of Sydney, Australia. “It’s good to be able to see the town and meet the people and your Colby mates.”

Wood was sitting on Main Street near Temple, chalking a pink flower on the sidewalk, as Colby freshman Pablo Castro, 19, of Darien, Connecticut, worked alongside her.

“It’s a good opportunity to get to meet people that I otherwise probably wouldn’t get a chance to know,” Castro said.

Waterville Main Street hired a Portland consulting firm, Nuf Sed, to orchestrate the activity, designed not only to help students get to know each other and the community, but also to explore ways to help make downtown more friendly to pedestrians and experiment with ways to add more walkable spaces there.

Square hay bales were placed at the four corners on downtown Main Street, designating activity areas. Traffic didn’t appear to be affected as drivers passed the park areas.

The project took place during a time when Colby is stepping up efforts to be more involved in and help revitalize the historic center of the city, make it a center for arts and culture and spur economic development.

Colby bought two distressed downtown buildings and has signed a contract to buy a third after Colby President David A. Greene met several times with downtown and city leaders, business people and others to determine what the city needs and how it can help. While Colby officials haven’t announced exactly what they might do with the buildings at 9, 16-20 and 173 Main St., they have said previously they are interested in developing a hotel, retail spaces and living areas downtown.

Businessman Bill Mitchell also recently bought two old buildings on Common Street, which he plans to lease to a restaurant, artists and professional people.

Joe Richards, owner of Headquarters Hair Styling on Main Street, came out of his shop Thursday to greet the Colby students, who were supervised by 22 upperclassmen in the orientation park projects, including golf putting at a “relaxation” park and an art mural.

“It’s fun seeing all these young people around,” Richards said. “I love having them. It’s energy, it’s exciting, it’s new faces and you can just see the energy and the fun.”

Richards, who has had his shop on Main Street for 39 years, said he never had seen activity like that on Main Street, and it was “fantastic.”

“I met a student from Bath who is third-generation Colby in his family,” Richards said. “He was excited.”

Richards told the student that his daughter, Elizabeth, graduated from Colby and Cornell University and is a tenured professor at the University of Southern Alabama, where she’s an art historian who specializes in women’s fabric art. Richards said his daughter wrote a book on the relationship of Colby and the Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture and worked at Colby’s museum every year when she was a Colby student.

Richards said he is excited about what is happening downtown with Colby having bought buildings and Mitchell having followed suit.

“It’s an opportunity that Waterville can’t not jump on and be positive about. I’m thrilled to death,” Richards said. “It’s going to be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for Waterville, and it’s going to build on itself.”

Near the KeyBank drive-thru, students created two parks on a large piece of carpet, with colorful wooden benches borrowed from Waterville Main Street and rose bushes from Sunset Flowerland & Greenhouses. They were lounging about, each asking where another was from and talking about the week’s orientation activities, which include a canoing trip on the St. Croix River near the Canadian border.

Barbara Joseph, 65, of Canaan, was chatting with the students and even competed in hopscotch on a grid students chalked on the pavement. Joseph said she was having a great time.

“I didn’t know anything about it, and I was just going downtown and started to see what it was all about,” Joseph said. “I am so impressed. They have so much energy. It’s bringing relationships and fun and creativity and interaction downtown.”

The students timed Joseph as she hopscotched the grid in 6.82 seconds.

Joseph and Colby freshman Graeme Brown, 19, of Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, chatted for some time, eventually exchanging emails.

“She’s an inspiring person,” Brown said, adding, “I’ve been to Colby three times and never to the downtown, so I’m happy to have the opportunity to spend time here.”

Nuf Sed partners Dela Taylor and Dugan Murphy, Waterville Main Street Executive Director Jennifer Olsen and Marie Sugden, executive assistant for Waterville Creates!, helped orient and guide students in the activities. Sugden was helping students on Main Street who were cutting out stencils and painting shapes on the sidewalk with paint that will show up only when it rains.

“It’s an exciting time for Waterville,” Sugden said. “It’s a great time for fresh blood coming into Waterville, and we’re really hoping to get the students involved in downtown.”

Colby junior Ted Simpson, 21, was a team leader for the parks project. He said orientation time is his favorite time of the semester. The freshman class this year consists of 510 students, and the others were taking part Thursday in all sorts of community service activities, including working on farms and helping out at Mid-Maine Homeless Shelter, he said. New students to Colby benefit from the orientation experience, which creates bonds and helps students feel more comfortable at a time when they are leaving home for the first time, he said.

“It’s a huge spectrum of people who are super-excited and people scared to leave their parents and people who are just nervous,” Simpson said. “There’s definitely a huge variety of emotions.”

As students in one of the parks played golf and got to know each other, Simpson said he deemed the day a success.

“It’s pretty cool,” he said. “It’s adding a little bit of color and life to Main Street – making it active.”

The students planned to leave the parks in place for the public to use and enjoy and come back to dismantle them at 6 p.m., when the regularly scheduled farmers market opens in The Concourse.